Sleeping Beauty Retold 2
by Little Snow
Summary: What if there never was a Prince Charming? It is the tale of Sleeping Beauty with a twist. Written in a general format and is slightly different from the story-telling format in order to match the general format. Reviews are most welcomed.


Once upon a time there was a princess

_Once upon a time there was a princess. _

_Her christening was lavishly done with everlasting trumpeting, gifts, and food. The people from all over the kingdom had streamed into the halls of the castle to witness and congratulate on the newborn princess…._

_The king had invited only twelve fairies to the celebration, for he only had twelve golden plates, for fairies would dine on no other. One by one the fairies gave their blessings to the baby princess. However, before the twelfth fairy could give her blessing, the uninvited thirteenth fairy suddenly appeared. She was furious for not being invited, and for her vicious revenge, she screeched out a curse before disappearing,_

"_On her fifteenth birthday, she will prick herself with a needle, and die!"_

_The twelfth fairy, who was well known for her kindness, felt sympathetic to the princess and decided to soften the curse,_

"_The princess will not die. Instead, she will fall into a century's sleep, in which she will then be woken by the kiss of true love."_

The thick and immense vines of thorns that surrounded the castle began to wither and crumble away. The old and lifeless castle seemed to be breathing again once more. Inside the biggest bedchamber laid a huge bed. Upon it laid a beauty none could have compared to.

The eerie silence woke her mind. Her head pounded uncomfortably, as images of the last event that happened filled her head. She remembered that a few days after her fifteenth birthday, she started to explore the castle. She had climbed up the stairs to the supposedly vacant northern tower, for she was curious by sounds of something that was rattling so merrily up there. She remembered that the sight that greeted her was an old woman who seemed to be making threads with a machine she had never seen before. That old woman had also asked her if she wanted to try… _spinning_? That word still seemed foreign to her. Then, she remembered pricking herself on the needle and nothing else after that except darkness.

The fluttering of her lashes was so unusual that she could feel them as they begin open for the first time in a century. The stillness of the room seemed unfamiliar to her, she could not hear the chattering of maids outside her chamber, nor the knights practicing swordsmanship outside her window. She winced slightly as she tried to sit up, her limps felt too heavy and awkward from the lack of use. As she laid down once again to allow her body to adjust, she took notice of the condition of her room. Her mouth opened in horror, and a soundless scream escaped her mouth. Her once lovely chamber was now beyond filthy, the once expensive oak wood table seemed rotten by dampness and it was filled with numerous holes bitten by termites, and the once elegant drapes were now scattered lose and very thin.

Her eyes darted wildly around the room. To her dismay, she found no one else except for herself. Terrified, her body shivered uncontrollably. She wasn't used to being alone in her bedchamber, since there were usually at least one or two maids in with her. Hurriedly, the young woman leaped off the bed, and as she did so, she found her knees buckling from the sudden pressure. She held on to the mossy aged wall to support her, and not daring to look anywhere else but ahead, she made her way across the room to the door.

Gently, she pushed opened the heavy oak doors. Her senses were all too well aware of the unnatural silence. She was not and never will be prepared for the sight that greeted her, and she froze with the sudden shock as and immense pain horror filled her. There, lying on the floor were four skeletons wearing the uniform of the castle guards.

Her chest tightened as she recognized one of the guards, the one with the sapphire ring, and an inevitable sob escaped her throat, as tears streamed from her eyes. She tired to will herself to believe that it was not true, that it was nothing but a nightmare, just a terrifying nightmare. However, the truth was could not have been less, but much too clear in front her, and the wetness of down her cheek was all but just further proof of the reality. Her body slumped down to the floor, as she pulled the skeleton closer to her body. Her throat became too tight to swallow as she cradled it against herself. She no longer cared why the wish didn't come true, for that moment, nothing else mattered more than the fact that she realized that he was dead…

It seemed that the world has abandoned her. The unbearable pain of loneliness grasped her. Never in her lifetime had she felt so helpless, so utterly alone. Slowly, she leaned forward and kissed the smooth white cheekbones…

Then she died.

_This is the untold truth in the famous tale of Sleeping Beauty. There wasn't a dazzling prince charming that bestowed a kiss of true love that woke princess from her century's sleep, nor did the castle slept and awoken as she did._

_This was the truth untold in the famous tale of Sleeping Beauty. There was no dazzling prince charming that woke princess from her century's sleep, with a kiss of true love._

_For the truth was that she woke up alone only to find that everyone else in the castle died. The twelfth fairy did not say that the castle would fall asleep with her nor did she say that the princess' true love will a dazzling prince that will be able to rescue her a century from now. How could they have known? That the Princess' true love was her childhood friend? How could they have known that he continued to protect her until mortality took away his life?_

_When she found him, she was so grief stricken that she couldn't have cared more or less if he was a skeleton and kissed him. After that, like the fairy said, she truly woke up, as she found herself in front of the gates of heaven. There, her true love welcomed her, it was also where the entire kingdom had been waiting for her. There, they rejoiced, and, and it was also there, where it comes to happily ever after._


End file.
